The project is a constituent of the NIH Graduate Partnership Program and serves to coordinate the doctoral research training and the university-NIH interface. The project provides trainees with molecular and comparative pathology educational content suitable for graduate credit at partnership universities. The Laboratory of Cancer Biology and Genetics, Molecular Pathology Unit (MPU) staff has responsibility for training and mentoring trainees. Trainees undertake pre-dissertation research within the MPU for which they receive university graduate course credit applicable for earning the Ph.D. degree as comparative biomedical scientists. The veterinary pathologists undertaking research training integrate pathology into the range of intramural research. Research topics include mechanisms of traumatic brain injury progression and protection, modeling oncogenic collaborating genes in leukemia, Ewing's sarcoma molecularly targeted therapy and function of EWSFLI1, p53 isoforms in glioblastoma, progression of melanocytic precursor lesions of melanoma, and inflammatory bowel disease. The educational infrastructure within the training consortium includes university collaboration with the Molecular Pathology Unit and builds upon an interdisciplinary and comparative orientation to problems in biomedical science. Program and trainee accomplishments for fiscal year 2016 include: Presently there are 8 pathologists in training, supported by all 4 of the NIH collaborating institutes. There are 15 program graduates who obtained PhD degrees. For the period of 2015 to present, current trainees (8) have authored or co-authored 15 peer-reviewed scientific journal articles: 8 research, 2 review, and 4 clinical articles published in journals including: Blood, J Neurol, BMC Genomics, Gynecol Oncol, Clin Cancer Res, J Chromotography, Pigment Cell Melanoma Res, J Clin Invest, JAVMA, Nature Communications, Analyst and Neuro-Oncology. Current trainees have achieved a variety of recognitions: 2015 NCI Directors' Innovation Award, 2 awardees 2015 ACVP Young Investigator's Awards, 2015 Center for Cancer Research Fellows and Young Investigators Colloquium Outstanding Poster Award, ACVP/ASIP Travel Award for the 2015 Experimental Biology Meeting in Boston, a Graduate teaching award, and 2 University awards. 4 veterinary students participated in the 2016 NIH Summer Internship Program in Biomedical Research (SIPBR) and trained in the labs of NCI, and NIAID. Program graduates finished PhD degree programs in pandemic influenza A virus infection, atherosclerosis, myeloma genetics, prostate cancer metastasis, brain microenvironment in breast cancer metastasis, and emergent human Nipah virus and Middle East Respiratory Syndrome (MERS) coronavirus pathogenesis.